Pain control is a major part of patient treatment in the medical field. For most patients, this is achieved via medication. It is of the utmost importance to ensure that the proper medication is received by the patient according to the instructions of the prescribing doctor and/or pharmacist. When a patient is in a hospital or assisted-care facility, the physicians, nurses and/or staff monitor the doses of medication given to a patient. When a patient is removed from those settings and care is provided at the home, the task may fall to family members or visiting nurses hired for the job. In many instances, the patient does not require round the clock care but requires assistance for specific tasks such as taking medication.
For example, it can be quite difficult for a patient with dexterity issues to manipulate and remove the correct dosage from traditional medication containers. Additionally, patients with memory loss, or those who suffer from degenerative disorders like Parkinson's or Alzheimer's, may have difficulty in adhering to prescription instructions with respect to the timing and prescribed dosage of their medication. Patient caregivers, while capable of helping with most daily tasks or activities, may have their own dexterity issues that prevent easy handling of patient medication, or may consist of a team of caregivers or family members who do not come at consistent times or may not have the requisite training or monitoring capabilities necessary to ensure timing and dosage requirements for patient medication are followed.
Traditional medication containers also provide insufficient safeguards to: prevent persons other than the patient from accessing the medications contained therein; protect against accidental or intentional overdose; and minimize the risk of addiction. Indeed, traditional medication containers provide the prescribing physician or pharmacist with absolutely no feedback on the patient's use, or abuse, of medications. Nor do traditional medication containers permit physicians to continue to prescribe necessary medications under strictly controlled circumstances to those persons suffering from addiction to the pills, or provide a mechanism that is capable of gradually treating addicts by reducing dispensed amounts of medication over time.
In these, and other, situations, a need is felt for a medication (also referred to interchangeably as “pill”) dispenser that can hold a large amount of medication and solves the aforementioned problems in the art by dispensing medication to patients at predetermined times, and/or if necessary on an as-needed basis, in a safe and secure manner.
Further limitations and disadvantages of conventional, traditional, and proposed approaches will become apparent to one of skill in the art, through comparison of such systems and methods with embodiments of the present invention as set forth in the remainder of the present application with reference to the drawings.